Reflecting on Hangzhou, 12x16

More Than Twenty Years Ago....
....and about this time of year, a group of artists journeyed to China to study in Hangzhou at a leading Chinese art school.  I was lucky enough to be part of the trip.

At that time China was just opening up to the world and many of the revolutionary effects of the Red Guard were still visible.....or weren't visible, having been destroyed.  Wandering around town I almost walked into the local military headquarters complete with tanks, lots of uniformed gun toting guards and full armament.  In the morning some very patriotic message driven music was played over the loud speakers for our wake up call.  This happened around 4:30 AM.  No shower because of no even slightly warmish water.

Breakfast was at 6:30 so we had a couple of hours to go paint or draw across the street in the park by a large lake in the center of town.  We had company as tai chi groups were doing their exercises.  The street sweepers were also out.  Picture small groups of women of modest means sweeping the streets using brooms they had just made from tied together twigs.

Below is a very quick study I did in those early hours and there was something about it I liked and hoped to revisit as a more completed work one day.  That day came about four months ago when I ran across it.....so working from the sketch and my memory the painting above is what I got.
 

 
I wouldn't have posted this at all but a member of that trip, Marilyn Webberley, commented on my last FB post and hearing from her brought back good memories of the trip.  I don't remember everyone who was along but Millard Davidson, Robert Moore, Bye Bitney, Linda Tippets, Diane McClary, and Scott Switzer are painters on that trip that I know are still swinging a brush.  Make a comment if you are one of the others so I can add you....

Loved meeting the Chinese students and seeing their work, much of which we have hanging in the house today.  We also laughed a whole lot....about the most ridiculous things.

Thanks for looking.





 

Leaving Orvieto, 8x10

The Winslow Art Center.....
.....has just announced my painting workshop in Umbria, very near Orvieto which we will visit.  I spent seven days in Orvieto during our last trip to Italy and not only is the city amazing but the countryside around it, where we will be staying, is terrific.  Take some time to check out the details HERE.  There are already people signing up.

Open to sketchers and/or painters in oil, gouache or acrylic, we will work both independently and as a group, around the villa and on day trips in the area.  More details on the website and from me later.  It looks terrific.

This small painting is actually on top of a portrait that ended up less than inspiring.  Turning the panel upside down I just blocked in the major 'dark' shapes.  I don't have a pic of the painting process but the block in looked something like this.....but with an upside down face under the paint.

Perhaps this will help to see it:

To me, when I squinted, the buildings were mostly in shadow and the sky and road carried the light.  You could just as easily have said the buildings are warm and the sky and road are cool....doesn't matter.  It's the division of shape characteristics that carries the weight of the painting.  As long as I did't go too far out of my original values (or temperature if that is how you see it) it was going to work.

Yes, there are light shapes in the dark areas.....or there are cool shapes in the warm areas....whichever.  Yet there aren't enough of those to break up the initial vision.

With those shapes loosely blocked there was no reason to draw any lines or create more definition.  I could begin 'paint carving' right away, using a limited number of values both lighter and darker than the shape.  Painting is just 'big shapes and doodads'.....I used to title my painting class that name.

By the way, here is a drawing I've posted before that was done just to the right of this vantage point maybe twenty feet and back.  Those houses on the lower left are the ones in the painting.  I drew it in the rain, shading my paper, markers and gouache with my hunched body.  It was fortunate that the heavy drops held off until about 2 minutes after I finished.

Thanks for looking.  Back soon.

Montisi, Italy

What is it about doing art....

....in another country?  How do these places let us look at the world with a fresh eye, not only when there but for long after coming home?  I've done painting and drawing in England, China, Hong Kong (before it was China), Mexico, France, Jamaica, Canada....and if I keep typing I'll likely remember other places.

Each time I sense I've grown as a person and an artist, and that feeling hangs with me.  It's a feeling of greater personal depth, of appreciation of another culture, of finding that no matter where I go that I like the people, their food and their customs.  My fears are their fears, my joys are their joys, my family is their family....it's just the little 'don't matter a bit' things that are different.

 I'm writing to invite you to paint and draw with me in one of the more unique places in the world, a very old hill town in Italy.  I don't know all of its long history but I do know that 'long' is the correct term, that it has suffered the wages of war over and over and rebuilt itself each time.  In WWII it was almost leveled, the population decimated, becoming close to a ghost town.  Yet here it is again redefining itself as a place for the arts and artists.  How could I not want to go and experience that kind of persistent spirit.  It must breath out of the bricks and stone.

Here are some more pictures and, if you are interested, you can go the Winslow Art Center website and investigate further.  Martha Jordan would be happy to answer any of your questions by mail, email or phone.  Ciao! (see how good I'm getting?) 

Most of these photos were taken by one of Martha's daughters who drove over to Montisi for the day.  Seeing these makes me just want to sink into the flavor of this place.